


How the Jellyfish was saved

by WahlBuilder



Series: Martian Tales [2]
Category: Mars: War Logs, The Technomancer (Video Game)
Genre: Fairy Tale Style, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-05-23 14:58:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14936466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WahlBuilder/pseuds/WahlBuilder
Summary: A traditional Martian tale about a poor Jellyfish.





	How the Jellyfish was saved

When the Human angered the Sun and Mars went up in flames, Martian creatures fled from the flames and burning rock. On feet and hooves they scuttled and careened and dashed and scurried away. 

The Jellyfish was slow, it had dried up and shrivelled since the days of heat had started, so when others ran, it was jostled and pushed and trampled and smashed and squashed and run over. On the shaking ground it lay, its stingers broken, its bell deflated. 

Four and four hours it lay there, waiting that the heat would dissolve it or the ground would crack under it and swallow it, but the heat did not come close and the groundquakes were distant. Night came, but no stars were seen, for the sky was obscured like during sandstorms: it was the anger of the Sun, breathing ash into the atmosphere and choking life.

It lay it knew not for how long, and lo! stars flickered into life—but they were no stars, for there were no stars visible on Mars anymore, and no stars would be visible for four and four tens of years.

And yet, the light-stars danced and twitched and formed into a figure, and some of those stars were black. The Black-Eyed One bent to the Jellyfish and said, ‘Poor, poor Jelly, left trampled and forgotten as everyone else fled. Whatever are you to do now?’

The Jellyfish was so weak that it could not answer. The stars-that-were-not-stars converged tighter into tendrils and picked the Jellyfish off the ground. ‘Poor, poor Jelly, left dry and broken as everyone else sought shelter. Whatever am I to do with you now?’

The Jellyfish twitched on the Black-Eyed One’s palm-that-was-not-a-palm and said, ‘Help me, O Black-Eyed One, and I will serve you forever.’

‘I do not require servitude, poor, poor Jelly,’ the Black-Eyed One said. ‘But I shall help you.’

The Black-Eyed One raised the Jellyfish, and nudged the torn flaps of its bell, half-transparent, and breathed into its bell. It billowed and filled with green gas, and the Jellyfish floated off the Black-Eyed One’s palm-that-was-not-a-palm. The Black-Eyed One breathed on the stingers, and they filled with life and cracked with electricity.

‘Nobody will ever hurt on you, poor, poor Jelly,’ the Black-Eyed One said. ‘If they try to jostle you and trample you and smash you and squash you and run you over, you will burn their eyes and singe their lungs and peel their skin off, and your children will be full of poisonous gas or burn with electric stingers.’

‘But I will die!’ the Jellyfish said.

The stars danced with laughter. ‘But your enemies will die also, is it not beautiful?’

‘Yes,’ said the Jellyfish. ‘It is.’

Thus, the Jellyfish was saved and filled with death.


End file.
